P R E F A C E .
P R E F A C E .
In the genera Sparus, Labrus, Perea, and Sciaena, which Linneus left
as requiring reformation, and w h ich have confessedly puzzled Forskal
as well as other travellers, I flatter myself with an allowance being made
for me, w h ich , with more diffidence, I wisli to be extended to other
instances o f error. — For the additions under much doubt made to the
genus Zeus, a kind o f reason, such as it is, has been offered in another
place.
I am fully sensible, that the vulgar names affixed to each species,
though collected with care, must be liable to error. It is almost inevitable
where the collector himself ignorant in the language, must trust to the
ear in seizing the pronunciadon o f words to w h ich he is incapable o f
affixing a meaning.
Lists o f local names written in the country dialects were procured from
Ganjam and Ingeram, w h ich differed from each other, wh ile both in most
instances differed from the current names at Vizagapatam. T h e number
o f fishes in the respective lists, said to comprehend the whole known at
each place, amounted in the first to between seventy and eighty, and in
the second to near one hundr ed: but there can be little doubt that many
species, not used by the natives as food, were not inserted.
or the Indian fishes delineated by Bloch, he acknowledges himself
indebted for many to the Rev. Mr. John at Tranquebar: and it is with
pleasure I take this public opportunity o f expressing my own obligations
to the same respectable Missionary, for Specimens and Drawings o f Serpents
received formerly, as well as within these few months.
Th e Drawings o f this Collection, as before mentioned, were executed
by a native o f India; and, by the advice o f artists at home, have undergone
only a few slight corrections. Of the Engravings some are by Heath,
others by Neele, and two or three by Skelton: but the greater part by
Reeve, a young diligent artist, who in the course o f this Work has made
progressive improvement. T h e initials o f the artists are engraved on the
respective plates.
t-l^eymoutb Street,
Dec. 10 , i 8o2.
T h e fishes caught at Vizagapatam, or in the vicinage, are most of
them probably common to other places on the coast. Having occasion
to make a short visit to Madras, I took the opportunity o f showing my
Drawings to some o f the principal fishermen assembled on purpose, who
readily recognized and named them; a few excepted. Soon after, on a
fishing party at St. Toma, in the vic in ity o f Madras, where several large
nets were dragged, I found some species o f Scomber and o f Clupea quite
new to me; but most o f the other Fishes were the same as at Vizagapatam.
In B loch’s General History also are several Coromandel Fishes w h ich I
had not before met with. T h e present collection may therefore be said
to contain a large portion, though not the whole, o f the fishes found on
that coast.